Idaho County free press. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho Territory) 1886-current, 1887-09-23
THE NgvA RIVER.
The Beauty, Purity and Picturesqueness oil
This Northern Water-Course.

A"o Deauty' furity ana Picturesquencss oil
This Northern Water-Course.
A mere neck of earth separates the
Russian cap tai from the great inland
sea of Ladoga, and through more than
forty intervenin versts of forest land.
green and wavy W t. the trembling AS.
pen. t re birch. the alder and the silver
pine. the Neva. moves maiesticallv
down its deep channel. by villages and
clearings, past scattered communes
and Struggling huts, between sounding
wo1d-Nar'ls and busy factories, till at
last' gliding along the famed granite
quays of the imperial city. it pours by
five broad mouths and narrow outlets
innum ,rable into the Gulf of Finland.
No Russian river has the beauty, the
purity, the picturesqueness which are
the attributes of this northern water
course; yet to fully appreciate the no.
bleness of its aspect in the warm ses.
sen, one must be familiar tn its win
try appearance. and above all wit
ness its vernal emanc patton from
the letters of frost by ukase
of the d" father of warmth" the
Slav Apollo, Da III Bog himself For
nearly six months Il ringing highway
for man and beast, the Neva grows I'M
safe for travel late in the m,nth of
April. and has usually resumed its free
dom by the be ginning of May; yet the
open ng of the attack on the crystal
ne mass precedes the m oment of its
melting by weeks. A month sometimes
elapses before the solar rays have begun
to senslbly thin the ice crust, and for a
month OF seeming defiance of the forces
of rcnaiss lnce droslies pursue their
chosen paths over the CONCEALED river.
pedestrians continu. to traverse it in
chair slides or on foot, the heavy wagons
of merchant and trader go rumbling
over in the same endless procession.
and the Samoye Is tn ,se Gypsies of the
north, cling with their rcindeers to the
camping ground of their winter exile
on the frozen stream, which is soon to
bear them back to their homes in the
Arctic circle.
The metamorphosis then fellows
With swiftness truly Russian. The
last screws and clasps of molecular
cohesion are drawn in single night;
the tn ckest ice pla'e then opens to its
solar enemy thousand lines of march.
In the morning with firm. quick steps.
you NAV safely traverse the Neva. still
Recovered; at noon, YOUR return is
barred by clear, swelling stream.
whose whilom bonds have turned to
dancing liquid facets, from which the
sun laughs back its light and its tri-
umph. True, the ice is not yet wholly
gone, bat it M ,ets the eye henceforth
purely as a spect zee the Offering not
of river, but of lake. This new
ice is the product of more northern
waters. the snowy DOCKS and bergs of
Ladoga. 81 ttering debris of an unequal
combat that every spring renows. For
some days after the breaking-up along
the Neva, in the interval between
the beginning of open and that
of sd e navigation. the river channel is
throngcd with broken strata, cleft
blocks, truncated pillars. shivercd col
umns; with spires and spears and
shafts; nay, with all shapeful and
shapeess masses, that half undergo
and halt escape degelation in the an
nual return of heat to the tar north.
Slowly the rank and file of this shining
host glide past, driving back to shelter
a fleet of venturesome ferry boats, bat
tering the bridge piers with dangerous
force and frequency, scraping the
quays with a sonorOus attrition, and
EN- tting throughout the duration of
their passage a strange rustling,
crunching sound. BY day striking, by
night solemn and weird. this scene
passes in its turn. and for six months |
the Neva presents the aspect which |
have described in the opening para
graph. Edmund Noble, IN AtItattc